


Tilted Axis

by Quecksilver_Eyes



Series: Narnia Musings [35]
Category: Chronicles of Narnia (Movies), Chronicles of Narnia - All Media Types, Chronicles of Narnia - C. S. Lewis
Genre: Gen, Pete carries the world, also me: one more though, me: I'm not gonna do any more fics comparing pete to atlas, that's the fic, thats it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-01
Updated: 2019-09-01
Packaged: 2020-10-09 03:35:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20482754
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Quecksilver_Eyes/pseuds/Quecksilver_Eyes
Summary: - How can one man carry the world on his shoulders and not break apart at the seams from it?- Narnia is not so big a world, my love. He managed.- Didn’t it kill him? All that weight, all this life?- We don’t know what killed him, pup. It could have been anything - maybe his legs gave out, or it was one of the wars that tore him apart.- Maybe it was the world.or:The Magnificent King, with his eyes like storm clouds, holds all the world on his shoulders and the echoes of loss on his cheeks.





	Tilted Axis

**Author's Note:**

  * For [aryelee](https://archiveofourown.org/users/aryelee/gifts).

> _\- How can one man carry the world on his shoulders and not break apart at the seams from it?_  
_\- Narnia is not so big a world, my love. He managed._  
_ \- Didn’t it kill him? All that weight, all this life?_  
_ \- We don’t know what killed him, pup. It could have been anything - maybe his legs gave out, or it was one of the wars that tore him apart._  
_ \- Maybe it was the world._

There’s no prophecy to expect them, this time, no hushed words underneath a hundred years of glass shard shaped snow, no blooming hope on all their tongues, no lullaby for them to hold onto. There’s nothing that talks of two kings and two queens, with the world cradled in their hands, on their shoulders, with eyes, wet and dull and new, with their hems wet and salt crusted, their feet grass stained. The world doesn’t stutter and freeze in anticipation, there is only all this brown seeping into the ground at Reepicheep’s paws, there is only the ursupator king and the way the blood drips from his hands and paints a path from all that Narnia has buried to the lines on his palms.

Narnia is suffocating under Telmarine iron and water, and sometimes, at night, when he can’t sleep, and all the stars have turned their backs to this world, Reepicheep’s body aches. His bones creak, and the blood in his veins stills and it feels as if all the world around him has been dipped underwater and dragged back out again, like there is a layer of salt and glass on his fur, his whiskers, his paws, his sword. Like his lungs are deflated and empty and struggling for air, but all the breath he can take is the trembling of his nose.

When he was just a pup, his eyes barely open, his paws curled inwards, and he spent his nights with his head thrown back, his eyes watching all the stars above, a wooden hand curled around his tiny body, a voice like the wind sang to him, swaying him softly. “_Where the sky and water meet / Where the waves grow sweet / Doubt not, Reepicheep /_ _To find all you seek,_ / _There is the utter East._” He can barely remember it now, this body – part blossoms, part wood, part desperate clinging to all that this world has once been, all that hasn’t yet been forgotten – he does remember the voice, and the apple blossoms fluttering about him, and the way his body seemed to _sigh_ at the thought of _East_ (golden hair and shrieking laughter, bare feet and a swift blade, human teeth that look almost like fangs, in the right light).

He knows almost nothing about the four Kings and Queens of Old when he stands before them, his blade drawn, and stares at a boy with trembling hands, a sword of legend at the Telmarine prince’s throat, the boy’s eyes cold and hard like a storm billowed sky in December. His clothes are too big and baggy on him, his hair tangled with dirt, his trousers crusted with salt, and he is just a child, barely older than he must have been when they all tumbled into the snow together, and followed a prophecy they didn’t know existed. _You’re it?_, Reepicheep thinks even as he sees Narnia settle atop the boys’ shoulders, the way they sag and square up, bearing all her weight. _You are the man whose shoulders once held all the world? You are Magnificent, with all the world’s skies etched on your skin?_

And then the boy looks at him, with storm grey eyes and the echoes of tears once wept over a dead brother, the shattering shards of what the witch had turned and rotten into, and Reepicheep’s body aches, as if the hurt in his bones, and the salt crusted all over him suddenly sighed in relief. _Hello_, says Narnia, groaning and aching and creaking under all their feet, _welcome home. _And Reepicheep bends his knees, and bows his head to the man who has come back and picked the world from their shoulders, again, straining for a breath._  
_

_I wonder, _he thinks, and is almost surprised by how light he feels, suddenly_, how long he can hold us up, like this. _


End file.
